A distributed architecture for the WSR-88D (NEXRAD) radar product generator (RPG)

In response to increasing user demand for additional capability and improved performance, the National Weather Service (NWS) launched a product improvement project to replace legacy computing platforms in the Next Generation Weather Radar (NEXRAD) radars, also known as the Weather Surveillance Radar-1988 Doppler (WSR-88D), with modern equipment. The first phase of this project targets the Radar Product Generator (RPG). Among many objectives of this project are hardware independence and portability of application software. In addition, long term viability and supportability of the NEXRAD system requires a modular and scalable architecture. To address these critical design requirements a distributed architecture based on open system standards has been adopted. This architecture is based on commercial workstation platforms in a networked environment. This paper presents the open system architecture and design issues associated with the RPG